Reserve Bank governor Alan Bollard said in a speech to a Hawkes Bay business audience this morning that early signs of global recovery have now emerged, and that we have avoided a repeat of the Great Depression.

However, world growth will likely be subdued for the next year or two, and the current low international interest rates, expansion of liquidity & central bank balance sheets, and fiscal stimuli will be necessary for some time, he said.

A new opinion poll shows nearly nine out of 10 New Zealanders think the recession will get worse and one in five rate unemployment as New Zealand’s most important issue.

UMR’s poll of 750 people taken in April found a whopping 86% of New Zealanders think the global financial crisis and its impact on New Zealand will worsen and one in three (33%) think it will get a lot worse or lead to a depression.

Most (55%) say it will be over a year before the economy picks up again; 41% expect it to pick up within a year.

The American Heart Association has recommended all heart patients should be screened regularly for signs of depression because of its high incidence.

This is the association’s first ever call to action addressing cardiac patients and depression, with the hope that routine screening will be done on every cardiac patient.

The publication Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association says depression is roughly three times more common in those hospitalised with heart problems than the general population.

Antidepressants may cause gastrointestinal (stomach and intestinal) bleeding, spelling more things to not be cheerful about if you’re on them.

According to a Spanish study published in The Archives of General Psychiatry, people taking the Selective Seratonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) or Seratonin and Norepinephrine Reuptake Inhibitors (SNRIs) drugs such as Prozac, Paxil, Celexa, Zoloft or Effexor, showed a heightened risk of erosion of the mucous membrane that lines the upper digestive tract.